


in the landscape

by prions



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Fragmented Narrative, M/M, Post-Canon, Tokyo (City)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-25
Updated: 2016-07-25
Packaged: 2018-07-26 14:57:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7578496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prions/pseuds/prions
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bokuto’s hair catches the late afternoon sunlight, drawing a halo around his head, like clouds illuminated by the sun. It makes Wakatoshi want to smile too. </p><p>“You’re a weird guy, Wakatoshi.”</p><p>-- Or, a journey in perspective by Wakatoshi</p>
            </blockquote>





	in the landscape

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inmatsuhanahell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inmatsuhanahell/gifts).



> here’s for my clouds, my stars, my sun to my moon, sky
> 
> (how does time progress in this fic, lol idk, it moved like my first year of university. fast, blurry, and with a couple of tears.)

The doors of the subway shut behind Ushijima Wakatoshi, and the train cars rush past as he takes a second to breathe.

He’s careful, in making sure not to look back.

 

 

 

Tokyo is big, and though he’s been here so many times, there’s something about the city that he still can’t come to grips with, something about the background that catches him off guard. Makes his legs shaky enough for him to mind his footing.

It’s definitely not like Miyagi, that’s for sure. 

And while Miyagi is not small, a respectable population of over 2 million, the scenery is constant, reliable, like the rice fields that grow a half hour drive away from his home, like the boats that catch oysters every morning at six AM, it’s familiar. There, Wakatoshi knows where he fits (top third in the country, number one in the prefecture), knows that he can take a place as part of the main scene. 

But Tokyo, Tokyo is different.

 

 

 

“Hi, I’m Bokuto Koutarou! You’re Ushijima, right?”

His roommate is a storm. 

An apt description considering his hair, with streaks of black and grey and white look like shadowed clouds pulled by the wind.

As Wakatoshi peers inside his dormitory room, he thanks the universe for his ability (curse, on some days) to keep the same serious expression on his face no matter the circumstance. On what he presumes is Bokuto’s side of the room, the luggage is haphazardly opened on the floor, clothes strewn around his bed and sheets messily placed on top, looking as if a hurricane had passed through.

His roommate, unfazed at Wakatoshi’s lack of response, pulls gently at his wrist, leading him in before hefting Wakatoshi’s luggage behind him and plops it unceremoniously on the bed opposite his own. 

Wakatoshi still feels off-kilter, like the ground is still shifting under his feet, but he let’s himself be led by Bokuto’s pace, if only just to distract himself. With a smile more blinding than the mid-afternoon sun, Bokuto says “Here, I’ll help you unpack.”

 

 

 

(For a second, out of the corners of his vision, he sees Semi’s silhouette, and Wakatoshi lets himself believe that he’s here too. That a piece of Miyagi followed him here. But he knows, it’s only a trick of the eye, and the similar colour of his roommate’s gravity defying hair, and Miyagi has stayed in Miyagi. Except, maybe, for him.)

 

 

 

It’s only later that Wakatoshi realizes that Bokuto is in nearly all his classes, and is, in fact, on a sports scholarship. Specifically, the same one as him. 

“Yeah, I’m a communications major,” Bokuto says from where he’s sitting on top of a lecture room desk, swinging his legs back and forth in rhythm with the clock on the wall. It’s early enough that the lecture room is still fairly empty, but the students who are here occasionally shoot them a glare whenever Bokuto accidentally kicks the legs of the desk after a particularly hard swing. Like his voice, the sound echoes in the room, and Wakatoshi wonders if there’s any part of Bokuto that doesn’t catch everyone’s attention.

Unlike him, Bokuto doesn’t seem to mind the attention, like the loud parts of him are an extension of himself he doesn’t notice anymore and can’t be bothered to change. Wakatoshi doubts that he even knows that there are people actively trying to burn holes into his head. 

(Wakatoshi knows that he plays volleyball with power, that people in high school seemed to cheer loudest for him. But outside of the court, outside of the prefecture, people see him as only a tall awkward kid, shuffling too slow for the city sidewalk traffic.)

He has only known Bokuto for a little over twenty-four hours but already knows that Bokuto is the type that can’t be contained. Bokuto is explosive, loud, expressive, and the fact that he’s still talking to Wakatoshi, even after a particularly terrible conversation that consisted of one sentence responses from one party, shows that he’s nothing but determined, specifically, to talk to him, for some particular reason.

“I’m just taking core curriculum common to most students right now, I heard it gets more specific to my major next year. You?”

“Japanese literature is my major and I’m doing a minor in history.”

“Wow! That’s so cool! I’m just taking communications because it makes sense, like, if I played on the national volleyball team I’d have to do a lot of interviews and I could represent charities and stuff. Which...is also pretty cool now that I think about it.”

“National volleyball team?”

Bokuto huffs, and abruptly stops swinging his legs. “Yeah, I want to play professionally!”

“I didn’t know you played.”

The flush that overtakes Bokuto’s face would have been funny, if not for the incredulous look on his face. “What!? How?! Can’t you tell from my physique? Don’t you recognize me from nationals?”

Wakatoshi internally cringes, already mourning the loss of a potential friendship. “Not really.”

“Well then,” Bokuto says sharply.. “When we practice in a couple of weeks when volleyball season starts, I’ll make sure you won’t ever forget me again!”

“Oh. Okay.”

 

 

 

On the court, Ushijima watches as the setter arcs the ball into Bokuto’s waiting palm. Seconds later, the ball slams onto the court at a thunderous speed. 

The way Bokuto plays seems to spark electricity in the air, and Wakatoshi can see as Bokuto closes his eyes and cheers, how the extra spark in the air seems to liven up his teammates. The grin on Bokuto’s face is infectious, as he reaches out both hands to high-five the waiting palms of the upperclassman setter. 

Bokuto catches his eye and bares a little more teeth in his smile, like a challenge.

_Try to forget me now, it says._

 

 

 

(He doesn’t.)

 

 

 

The sunlight is kissing the tops of the trees when Wakatoshi hears the steps of fast approaching feet behind him. 

“Hey! Ushijima! Wait up!” At the sound of a familiar voice, Wakatoshi slows his own feet, until the owner of the quick footsteps matches his pace and walks beside him.

“Bokuto-san.”

Grinning impishly, Bokuto moves to walk in front of him, stepping backward for each foot forward Wakatoshi makes. He looks him in the face, and Wakatoshi suddenly wants sunglasses. “Y’know, you’re kind of weird. Whenever someone calls out to you, you never look back you just wait for them to come to you. Is that some sort of weird superiority complex?”

There’s a pause before he responds, one that neither of them acknowledges, but Wakatoshi knows Bokuto notices, quiet except for their matching footsteps. “No, it’s not a superiority complex.”

“Then, what is it?”

“Just a superstition.”

“About what?”

Wakatoshi sighs, resigning himself to talking more than he’d like about a topic that he knows bores people, even Reon, who had an appreciation for the stories Wakatoshi found, could only take so much of it at a time. (He should call him sometime.)

“It’s a superstition based on a Greek myth,” Wakatoshi starts, choosing to look at Bokuto’s feet rather than his face. “Orpheus and Eurydice. Two lovers. When Eurydice died Orpheus went to the Underworld to take her soul back, and Hades, ruler of Hell allowed him to bring her back only if he never looked behind him as he led her out into the world.”

“But then he looked back, right? And he lost her.”

Startled, Wakatoshi lifts his face to see a grin on Bokuto’s face. “You know this myth?”

“Yeah, it was a cool story I read for English class.” Almost sheepishly, Bokuto turns his face a bit to the side, breaking eye contact. “I’m not that good in stuff like math, or the more technical sciences, but I liked books and stories.”

Wakatoshi hums, and Bokuto makes eye contact with him again, impish grin on his face again. “Are you a romantic, Wakatoshi? Scared if you look back you’ll never find and keep a lover or something?”

Wakatoshi lets the moment pause again, and tries to decide how to answer. Bokuto’s tone implies he’s joking, but being around him makes Wakatoshi want to be bold. To share more, to talk more.

“Is it still romantic if I’m worried more about my dreams following me than a lover?”

For a moment the smile on Bokuto’s face is gone, and Wakatoshi worries that he’s said the wrong thing. Instead, there’s an expression that’s more thoughtful, a small upturn on the corner of one lip that he can’t help but zoom in on. 

Bokuto snorts once before grinning and tilting his head back to laugh, and Wakatoshi releases the tension in his shoulders he didn’t know he had. Bokuto’s hair catches the late afternoon sunlight, drawing a halo around his head, like clouds illuminated by the sun. It makes Wakatoshi want to smile too. 

“You’re a weird guy, Wakatoshi,” he says, “but I agree with you, bro. Why worry ‘bout love when you’ve got dreams as big as ours.”

 

 

 

(“How did you know I also wanted to play professionally?”

“Ha! I’ve seen you play before, and no one who plays like you can imagine a life without being on the court.”)

 

 

 

Sometimes, after practice, they’ll run together.

Wakatoshi’s teammates call them masochists, and maybe he is. (He’s not sure about Bokuto.)

It’s not leisurely, not even when Wakatoshi runs without the urge to tire himself out. He charges ahead until he feels the strains in his legs, till he heaves in his chest, his throat starts to sting. He runs until he runs himself dry so that he isn’t up all night soaking in his thoughts.

He knows Bokuto notices. Notices how he often he turns in his sheets in the night, like he wants to make a whirlpool of blankets that will swallow him whole. Bokuto doesn’t say anything, which is a surprise. But Wakatoshi sees a mirror of his own dark circles under Bokuto’s eyes and can’t help but feel chastised anyway. There’s a reason why no one likes it when grey clouds overcast the sun.

For all the extra time he’s spent in Tokyo since the last time he got off the Miyagi train, he still can’t figure out why he still feels like he’s walking on uneven ground, even though the sidewalks are paved and flat under his feet. 

He’s doing well enough, in practice, and has played a few games as a starter. Wakatoshi knows he should feel proud, to at least be given a chance to be on court. Classes are fine, and he likes them, he’s doing okay enough that his parents don’t lecture or worry over him.

And while everything _should_ be fine, he still feels like he’s always seconds away from faltering in his steps and falling, falling, _falling_ to the ground.

 

 

 

(“You don’t have to run with me, if you’re not feeling up for it, you know.”

“Yeah, but, I also do this for me, too.”

“Oh.”

“Akaashi, my setter in high school, told me whenever I get down, I needed to work myself up, in the right way, to make myself feel better.”

“Get down?”

“Yeah.”)

 

 

The change is spectacular, to say the least.

Bokuto jumps up to go for a straight in practice and its shut down for the nth time today. Wakatoshi can see the fluster in his blush, the way his shoulders tense up, before he lets out a short but loud yell and storms off the court. The gym is silent, as he stomps off towards the lockers, and the other players look at each other in confusion.

One of the coaches starts to stand and turns to walk after him, but Wakatoshi finds himself telling them that he’ll go check on him instead.

He finds him at the sinks in the locker room, drenching his head in cold water. Slowly, Bokuto lifts his head and fixes his gaze on himself in the mirror, mouthing words to himself that Wakatoshi can’t make out.

Wakatoshi stands, transfixed, until he realizes that this isn’t something he should be watching, and begins to back out.

An empty water bottle skitters across the floor when he accidentally kicks it, and Bokuto jerks his head in the direction towards the sound, making eye contact with Wakatoshi. “Oh. I’m sorry.”

There’s a pause, between Wakatoshi’s apology and Bokuto’s response, one that both of them notice but neither will acknowledge.

Bokuto raises both of his hands and slaps his palms on his cheeks.”Osu! Thanks for checking up on me. Let’s get back to the court!”

 

 

 

 _What were you saying?_ Wakatoshi wants to ask, but doesn’t.

Without any cue, Bokuto responds, kicking a stone out of the way on the trail path back to their dormitory.

“When I need to get back in check, without having any time to work myself back up again, I just repeat this mantra-thing I found on the internet.”

Bokuto jogs a bit ahead of him, and winds back to kick a pile of smaller rocks. “I just keep saying, ‘You’re okay, you will be okay, you have always been okay’ over and over until I believe it!”

“Oh, does it work well?”

“Hm, I guess sometimes it takes longer than other times, but mostly I like it because of Akaashi.”

“Oh.”

 

 

 

There are days when the off-feeling doesn’t subside, instead, rises and bubbles acidically at the surface of his being, until he feels the tanginess at the back of his throat.

It itches and burns until one night, after a long practice, a longer run, and a shower that feels like eternity. Wakatoshi tells Bokuto, straight out of the shower, about how dwarfed he feels, how out of place he seems to be, while under a mountain of blankets, and his eyes fixed on the ceiling above him.

Bokuto draws closer, and looks at him from above, close enough Wakatoshi can feel the puffs of breath on his face, see the slight crinkle in his brow. Water drips down from his flattened hair onto the towel draped onto his shoulders, and for the briefest second, Wakatoshi wants to take it and dry it for him.

“I understand you, but I also don’t.” Bokuto starts. “Yes, Tokyo is big, and yes, it can make you feel small, but don’t you find that, I don’t know, refreshing?”

Wakatoshi opens his mouth, closes it, and opens it again to wet his lips. He knows that he stands, as of now, at exactly 193.04 centimetres, but every centimetre feels insignificant under the burden of the the harsh street lights, the press of people in the crowded subway, the insignificance he feels as a part of this great big city.

“No.”

Bokuto pouts, and Wakatoshi watches as he nibbles on his lower lip. Slowly and carefully, Bokuto brings his hands to Wakatoshi’s shoulders, squeezing before pushing him to lay next to him on the bed. He shifts him carefully, arranging them so that Wakatoshi brackets him between the wall and himself.

Like this, cramped between the wall and a warm body, shifted so that he has to look up to meet Wakatoshi’s eyes, Bokuto looks small. Wakatoshi hums at the smile threatening to take over Bokuto’s tanned face. He feels like he’s looking at a miniature sun.

Strangely, it makes him feel big.

“How’s this?”

“Refreshing.”

 

 

 

(“What does the mantra have to do with Akaashi?”

“Oh it’s some weird chemistry shit he equates it to, that I just like hearing from him. Like apparently there’s this electron cloud theory where you can’t ever know where the electron is. You can just, uh, guess where it is or something, in a certain area. So like a cloud. So you know where it can be, but not where it is exactly.”

“Mhm.”

“So if you ‘make the electron symbolize _okay_ ,’ a direct quote from Akaashi, “okay” is uh, a constant. It could be you’re okay now, you were okay then, you will be okay later, but you don’t necessarily need to know where it is precisely, at the moment.”

“I see.”

“Yeah.”)

 

 

 

It helps, having Bokuto in his bed. 

At night, it stops him from tossing so much, and when Bokuto falls asleep he syncs their breathing, until he loses consciousness. 

There’s a thought in the back of his head that this isn’t what friends do, friends don’t share beds like this, they don’t comfort each other as closely like this, but he quiets it. He doesn’t want to deal with this now, on top of everything else he’s feeling.

When he falls asleep it’s dreamless, but he doesn’t mind.

In the morning, Bokuto wakes before him, and like a hurricane, moves without being able to overturn anything, or anyone in his path. When he stretches, he knocks his fist into Wakatoshi’s head, jerking him out of his sleep.

“Oh, sorry, bro!”

“It’s fine.”

Bokuto yawns, and stretches his hands above his head again, smiling in satisfaction when his back pops. “Y’know, I was thinking, about what you told me, about how you’re feeling. Maybe it’s like, a perspective issue. Say, ‘Cuckoo’s Nest, by Kesey. You’re Bromden, stuck in a rut in the psych ward in a mould he’s made for himself, until he realizes that he can break the mould, as grossly cheesy as it sounds, he can’t get out.”

Wakatoshi hums, and Bokuto smiles, something smaller than before. “Or, y’know, maybe not.”

 

 

 

(“Uh, what is Akaashi to you?”

“A friend, and more than a friend. But still a friend, you know?”

Wakatoshi thinks of Tendou, of friendly hands on his shoulders, half-hearted hugs that Tendou would jokingly complain about, a teasing bump of the hips when they used to run together. “Yeah, I know.”)

 

 

 

Their first game is a loss.

It’s against another university in Tokyo, and across the court, before the game, Oikawa Tooru sneers at him. 

“Of course you’re here in Tokyo, too, Ushiwaka.”

Wakatoshi frowns, it’s been several years but he still can’t get the handle on speaking to Oikawa. “Yes.”

“Well then, we’re going to crush you.”

The game is close, by the end of the second set, each time has one to their name, and by the time most of the third set has rolled around, everyone is exhausted, but still trying their best. Wakatoshi had watched as most of Bokuto’s spikes had gotten blocked, and now, cringes at the feint that was easily seen through. It’s not a crushing defeat, per say, but it’s obvious, that Oikawa, who was sent in to direct the third set, was a wild card who knew how to precisely control his team.

Wakatoshi thinks, that maybe a reminder of Miyagi would have made him feel better, but the sight of Oikawa just brings the lingering feeling of being out of place to the surface instead.

From across the court, Oikawa sends a smirk when he meets Wakatoshi’s eyes, and turns away to pat the blocker who’d intercepted Bokuto’s feint. Wakatoshi thinks he recognizes him, as the ace from Seijoh. Oikawa draws his arm across the player’s shoulders, who turns to gently butt Oikawa’s head with his own, as their team circles around them to celebrate. 

“Oh.” Wakatoshi says.

After the team picks themselves off the court after lap upon lap of penalty flying receives, it’s just him and Bokuto, lying in their own sweat on the gymnasium floor, the court cold under their warm backs.

“I miss my team.” Wakatoshi says, without prompting. “My team made me feel like there was a place that I fit. They made me feel like I was the best.”

Bokuto turns his head, and Wakatoshi knows that his eyes are tracing his profile. Out of his periphery, Wakatoshi knows that the smile Bokuto bears is blinding, and and his eyes are proud. “But you know,” he says. And this time it’s not just eyes that trace his profile. Rough hands with calloused fingers trace the characteristics of his face. Wakatoshi doesn’t find that he minds.

“I know what?”

“You can still feel like the best, by yourself.”

“You must have a lot of experience in that.”

The laugh that comes out of Bokuto’s mouth might as well be thunder, with how it booms inside the gym. “Yeah, yeah I do.”

And Wakatoshi laughs at the irony, at how a boy who encompasses the weather, a constant background in the landscape, seems to draw attention no matter where he goes.

 

 

 

(“When I first met you, the way you looked and acted reminded me of the weather. Actually, you still do.”

“No way! I always get owl!

“I don’t really see it.”)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> if you want me, [you've got me](http://www.twitter.com/daiishou)


End file.
